I changed the world.

Page 144

"Hey, Taozi?"

"Yeah, haha... Happy New Year!"

"Hmm...hmm...I have to go back eventually."

"Yes, go to my uncle's place."

"No need, I have some things to do this year. I'll go back after the New Year. Oh... okay, please give my early New Year's greetings to your parents for me."

Zhang Jing put down the phone. It was his childhood friend Wang Tao who had called him. The Spring Festival is the most important festival in Dazhao. This year, Lunar New Year's Eve is on February 11. Neither Wang Tao nor Zhang Jing are locals, so they are supposed to go back to their hometowns to celebrate the festival.

Zhang Jing's situation is somewhat special. His parents are no longer alive, and he only has an old house in his hometown, so he doesn't necessarily have to go back on New Year's Eve.

Wang Tao called to ask if he wanted to drive back to his hometown together this year. Considering he had a lot of things to do, Zhang Jing declined. He had already made arrangements with his uncle to visit him on the first day of the Lunar New Year.

In fact, back in his hometown, his uncle's family was the only relatives he still kept in touch with. Since his parents passed away, his uncle and aunt had taken good care of him, a fact he could still empathize with even though he was a transmigrator.

"If someone treats me with respect, I will treat them with even greater respect"—this is Zhang Jing's philosophy. Basic manners are still essential.

After returning from Yunxiao Temple, Zhang Taihe supervised the construction of the building complex in Lishan Cave. In his spare time, he explained some cultivation issues to Zhang Jing. Recently, Zhang Jing has made great progress and has been intensifying his cultivation.

However, so far, he hasn't noticed any major side effects from the wishing book, which makes him somewhat anxious and he hasn't dared to continue using it recently.

On the other hand, Jiang Shanlin has been working with great enthusiasm lately, and various tasks are progressing very rapidly. The basic framework has been initially established, the initial integration process has been completed, and overall efficiency is increasing.

The foundation's internal database has been optimized to a second version, which is much better than the first version in terms of stability, security and user-friendliness.

What pleased Zhang Jing even more was that during his most recent check, he discovered that the database now contains 1812 cultural relics, a significant increase in the overall number of relics compared to before.

Furthermore, Zhang Jing had already reviewed the industry research reports from both Guanghe Management Consulting and Eagle Eye Research, and overall, they were quite professional. The report from Guanghe Management Consulting, in particular, demonstrated a more international perspective, especially in its in-depth research on companies outside of Dazhao, showcasing its strong capabilities in the field.

Under Zhang Jing's instructions, the foundation signed a long-term contract with him in this regard, requiring him to issue an industry research report every six months to provide better guidance for the foundation's investment plans.

To date, the foundation has invested in seven companies, and is in negotiations with five others. In addition, several investment managers are conducting due diligence on relevant companies in various locations.

Overall, everything went relatively smoothly.

With the year-end approaching, the foundation is quite busy with a series of tasks, including audits, as per Zhang Jing's initial financial regulations.

In addition, under Zhang Jing's leadership, the foundation also distributed year-end bonuses to every employee, including Jiang Shanlin, before the end of the year. Since the foundation had just started this year and most of the employees were new hires, Zhang Jing finally decided that, in principle, the year-end bonus would be distributed at half a month's salary, with the specific distribution details to be drafted by the human resources department.

In Zhang Jing's view, this was essentially a case of spending a fortune to acquire a horse's bones.

However, to his surprise, this action was met with unanimous cheers from everyone in the foundation, and his popularity, which was almost never seen within the foundation, instantly soared to its peak.

The reason is simple: most companies in the world, except for the well-known large corporations, do not have a formal year-end bonus system. At most, they may receive some uncertain subsidies at the end of the year when performance is good, but these are usually not much. This is even more true for newly established organizations like foundations.

This led everyone at the foundation to view Zhang Jing as a "generous" tycoon. Many people were even eager to make a good impression during his time there.

Zhang Jing opened his email and, as expected, found a bunch of work emails from the foundation. It was the end of the year, and there were many matters that required his approval as chairman.

In addition, Jiang Shanlin called him yesterday to invite him to the company's annual meeting, but he was still in Dinghai at the time, so he declined and asked him to convey his greetings to all the employees.

After replying to the company emails, Zhang Jing opened the database and used the filtering function to select cultural relics that met his requirements.

After setting the time range, the database automatically selected 1131 cultural relics within that time frame. Zhang Jing then opened the list of cultural relics and began to browse through them…

In the end, Zhang Jing selected 27 cultural relics, which was indeed a very good harvest for him.

Just as Zhang Jing was composing a new email, urging Jiang Shanlin to quickly arrange for people to buy these cultural relics, his cell phone rang again.

"Hello... um, is this Brother Ziyu?"

"This year... I won't be going on New Year's Eve..."

"Hmm...hmm...I'll still go to my uncle's place on the first day of the Lunar New Year."

"Um……"

"That's it..."

"Then on the second day of the lunar new year... I'll come to visit my uncle on the second day of the lunar new year."

"Um...um...okay, that's settled then...Happy New Year..."

After hanging up the phone, Zhang Jing remained silent for a while, then sighed.

The caller just now was Zhang Xin, the son of his father's eldest brother, also known as Zhang Ziyu. His father came from a declining noble family with two brothers: his uncle Zhang Yue was the eldest son, and his father Zhang Jin was the second son. It's quite a dramatic story, actually.

At the beginning of this dynasty, in accordance with the decree of the founding emperor, members of the imperial family and meritorious officials were granted titles. At that time, eight ranks were established, namely Prince, Prince of the Second Rank, General of the State, General of the State, General of the State, Lieutenant General of the State, Lieutenant General of the State, and Lieutenant General of the State.

After several reforms, especially a major reform during the reign of Emperor Huanzong, a system of six ranks—prince, duke, marquis, earl, viscount, and baron—gradually took shape, which was roughly equivalent to the aristocratic systems of other major countries in the world.

The system of this dynasty is different from that of many foreign countries. The titles of nobles are only granted with a salary and no fiefs. This makes it quite common for the family fortunes of some middle and lower-ranking nobles to decline if their descendants are not good at managing their businesses.

The Zhang family's hereditary title was the lowest rank of baron. Because their great-grandfather's attempt to invest in business failed, by the time their grandfather, Zhang Hengbang, inherited the family business, the family had already declined. Aside from their annual stipend, which never increased, they only owned some farmland and three shops in the county town. While they were still considered a well-off family overall, they were no longer comparable to other noble families.

This forced the Zhang family to gradually withdraw from the social circles of nobles, since social activities among nobles were quite expensive.

Reviving the family business had always been Zhang Hengbang's cherished pursuit. Similar to many melodramatic plots, the grandfather naturally placed considerable expectations on his two children's marriages.

As the two children grew up, the eldest son, Zhang Yue, married the second daughter of a nobleman who was also of low rank but whose family was much better off than Zhang's. Overall, it was considered a good match.

As the second son, Zhang Jing's father, Zhang Jin, was originally arranged to marry the eldest daughter of a wealthy merchant. In Zhang Jing's current view, his grandfather was probably after the generous dowry, a common practice in many countries today. Many wealthy merchants of modest social standing were willing to marry into declining noble families in order to enhance their own social standing.

However, who knew that Zhang Jing's father would fall in love with Zhang Jing's mother, who was considered by his grandfather to be from a humble background?

What followed was a farce of being forced apart, running away from home, and never seeing each other again until Zhang Jing's parents passed away. He never returned to his hometown again.

On the contrary, Zhang Jing's eldest uncle still occasionally kept in touch with his father. In Zhang Jing's memory, his father and eldest uncle had a pretty good relationship. His eldest uncle had always wanted to mend the relationship between his father and younger brother. However, both of them were stubborn, and this idea was never realized until Zhang Yue passed away.

It is said that after Zhang Jing's father passed away, Zhang Hengbang finally regretted it and wanted to take Zhang Jing back to his hometown to be raised. However, it was too late to undo the damage. Zhang Jing was also a proud man and resented his grandfather's actions towards his parents. He did not acknowledge his grandfather at all.